


points of constant

by kuro49



Series: thirty days of writing '18 [12]
Category: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, DC Extended Universe, DCU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drabble, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-03
Updated: 2018-09-03
Packaged: 2019-07-06 07:34:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15881478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kuro49/pseuds/kuro49
Summary: In every version of the universe, Lois is the key. And the weight of her death is the one to tip the scale.





	points of constant

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kakakc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kakakc/gifts).
  * Translation into 中文 available: [points of constant 恆常之點](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15886122) by [kakakc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kakakc/pseuds/kakakc)



> the canon divergence fic where Superman couldn't save Lois in time when Luthor drops her off the building in BVS, instead he only knew about his mother being in danger and saves her first. 
> 
> prompt: the place where we used to meet. idea: all ka's.

 

A demi-god, an alien, and a man walk into a bar.

There is a good punch line somewhere here that doesn’t end with a punch thrown.

 

“Bruce.” Clark says in greeting when the man sits down on the bar stool next to him. On the other side, she settles too. “Diana.”

Both of them find their drink of choice sitting in front of them before they even make the order.

“Clark.” They both say in answer, and he hears what goes unsaid. Their condolences never waver, year after year. They are weary, not wary and it shows the years in between. It is never the same bar but it is always the same date when another year goes by.

 

In every version of the universe, Lois is the key.

And the weight of her death is the one to tip the scale.

 

Superman disappears from the world in the aftermath of Doomsday.

In between this headline, in the pages that are read and flipped and flipped until the newspaper print is smudges of black at the fingertips, Lois Lane’s death is published. In the hundreds and thousands that are dead, her name is one of many.

A hundred years ago Diana walked away. A hundred years later, Wonder Woman stands with them for that single battle against Lex Luthor’s creation.

Standing beneath a tree on a cold Sunday morning, steps away from the gravestone they erect in her name, Bruce Wayne does not ask her for her help. They wait in silence while Clark mourns, a ring never offered sitting like dead weight in his pocket. Because if it takes Lex Luthor to cause a ruin of this scale, there are plenty more to take his place in this cycle of destruction.

 

Bruce knows what happens to those he recruits to fight his war, he has a glass case to make sure he never forgets.

It is Batman who still finds the metahumans but it is a warning that he leaves with them instead.

 

The lights are low, the grain in the wood of the bar top is worn down.

“Where have you been to as of late?” Diana asks, taking a sip from her glass before glancing at the plaid shirt beneath the thick coat Clark is wearing.

Clark tips his drink back to down a good quarter. He’s made the trek to the highest peak, he’s touched the rocks of Marianna’s trench, he’s also been back home to his mother’s farm. “At this point, I think you can start asking me where I haven’t been to start.”

“Themyscira.” Bruce supplies in answer.

Diana laughs and neither one of them brings up the only man that’s been.

With a single battle between the three of them, there is little history. Maybe it is the visceral pain to grief that ties them together, to lose what is equivalent to hope for them in one fell swoop.

 

Life is bound to death, and loss unequivocally to hope.

What breaks can be put back together, but the dead do not come back to life. There is no justice to be found in a world like this, and it’s about time they stopped looking.

 


End file.
